She’s getting a little help from the city, but she needs a lot more help from her neighbors.

The St. Mary’s parishioner lives across the street. She pointed toward her house, just a stone's throw away.

One of her kids yelled, “Mom!”

She answered and asked the child to wait a few minutes. She leaned down to pick up a bottle of water, one of the least nauseating strands of litter carpeting the ground.

Many nights Pittsley has watched as car after car files into the fairly secluded parking lot just off Broadway. She said cars pull in. People do drugs. People have sex.

The trash entangled at the base of a massive hedgerow is evidence she’s right.

Residue-caked pill bottles and tiny little bags have been tossed together with dead leaves in a dreadful ground salad.

“That parking lot, for as long as I can remember, has been used for peoples’ personal dumping station, a place to do drugs and unfortunately a place were people have intercourse,” Pittsley said.

A priest at the church gave her permission to hold a cleanup on Saturday.

Bryan Klugh owns the building at 135 Washington St. He rents a few of the lot’s parking spots from the diocese.

“It’s tough to keep up with,” he said Friday afternoon. He plows snow from the lot during the winter. Once, he hired youth baseball players to clean up the lot.

Pittsley is on a mission to clean up her neighborhood. She contacted her local legislators, the police, mayor and city councilors.

“Kathryn is a wonderful example of what one concerned citizen can accomplish,” said state Rep. Shaunna O’Connell, R-Taunton. “Because of Kathryn’s tenacity, her neighborhood will be safer for all families. I admire the pride she shows in our community and thank her for her efforts.”

City Councilor John McCaul reached out to Pittsley. He told her he’d be there Saturday with bags and bottled water.

The city’s Department of Public Works will pick up the trash gathered by Saturday’s cleanup.

Pittsley wanted to publicly thank all of them for their help.

She’s also focusing her attention to speeding issues and pedestrian safety in the neighborhood. In a letter sent to the city, she requested a bus stop warning and speed limit signs.

“I am glad that you have people within our community that take pride in their neighborhoods and go the extra mile to improve upon them,” said Taunton Mayor Thomas Hoye Jr. “There are some within our city that go the extra mile and they should be commended.”

Pittsley plans to be at the parking lot at 8:30 a.m. Saturday morning.

Anyone who feels the way she does about the disgusting grade of litter infiltrating her neighborhood is welcome to show up and help her fight back with a bag and a pointed stick.